Jollibee apologizes to ‘chicken sad’ customers

By: 10 years ago

SCREENGRAB from jollibee.com.ph

No cause for alarm; there’s no shortage of Chicken Joy, just a computer glitch that has resulted in a slowdown in the delivery of your favorite fast-food item.

So explained Jollibee Foods Corp. (JFC), the country’s largest fast-food chain, as it apologized on Friday for the lack of popular products on its menu and the closure of outlets.

In a stock exchange filing on Friday, the company explained that the disruption in the supply was related to its migration to a new IT system at the start of the month, and that the issue would be resolved “in the next few days.”

“The product limitation has been caused by the migration to new systems that started on Aug. 1, 2014, which has resulted in a temporary slowdown in sales order taking, product loading and dispatch of transportation,” Jollibee said in its statement which came amid complaints and even ridicule on social media.

Ruffled feathers

“No such thing as #ChickenSad in the house of #SoGood,” tweets @KFCPhilippines, the American fast-food chicken chain famous for its “Finger lickin’ good” ad slogan.

This apparently ruffled feathers among Jollibee’s distraught fans who took to social media as well, making #ChickenSad, a spoof of Chickenjoy, a trending hashtag.

Tweeted Merilyn Cabiling Ong: “Hindi na sya jollibee… saddybee na.”

Another Jollibee rival, “Chicken McDo” entered the fray, making the brawl a three-chicken derby.

In a photo comment now going viral, mascot “Jollibee” beats up rival “Ronald McDonald” over the missing Chickenjoy.

2,244 stores nationwide

“Kenkoy ka! San mo tinago ang mga chicken joy (You clown! Where did you hide Chickenjoy?),” the fuming Jollibee mascot asks its rival mascot, Ronald.

“Di ko alam… tanong mo kay Kentucky. O kaya kay Mang Inasal (I dunno. Ask Kentucky. Or Mang Inasal),” McDonald’s clown answered.

Jollibee, which is also behind fast-food brands Chowking, Greenwich, Mang Inasal and Red Ribbon, acknowledged that the limited availability of certain food items had caused the temporary closure of 72 stores across its brands, mainly in Metro Manila and nearby cities.

The company said the figure represented 3.2 percent of its 2,244 nationwide network, and that the disruption meant it had not been able to serve 6 percent of its normal nationwide sales in the first seven days of August. Despite that, the same store sales during the period were up 4 percent, it added.

The new system, where the company invested at least P500 million for 2014, involves integrating store information systems to accelerate business growth in the country and abroad.

Jollibee said it had enough raw materials, finished products and production capacity to meet consumer demand for its popular food items “for the entire month of August and the months ahead.”

Because of the current slowdown, these products have been stored in Jollibee’s various commissaries, warehouses and logistics centers, the company said.

In its statement, Jollibee said “the organization (was) doing its best to restore the availability of all its products to normal levels in the next few days, reopen temporarily closed stores and restore its excellent service to its customers.”

PH’s largest food network

Jollibee Foods Corp. operates the largest food service network in the Philippines. As of June 30, it was operating 2,244 restaurant outlets in the country spread across the following brands: Jollibee (839), Chowking (406), Greenwich (207), Red Ribbon (298), Mang Inasal (456) and Burger King (38).

Abroad, it was operating 589 stores: Yonghe King (311), Hong Zhuang Yuan (43) and San Pin Wang (44), all of them in China. Jollibee has 30 outlets in the US, 49 in Vietnam, 12 in Brunei, 10 in Saudi Arabia, 4 in Qatar, 3 in Kuwait, 1 in Hong Kong, and 2 in Singapore. Red Ribbon has 31 outlets in the US; Chowking has 19 outlets in the US, 20 in the United Arab Emirates, 5 in Qatar and 2 in Oman. Jinja Bar has 3 outlets in the US.

In all, Jollibee has 2,833 stores worldwide.

JFC also has a 50-percent interest in joint ventures for the following stores: Highlands Coffee (Vietnam, Philippines), 78; Pho 24 (Vietnam, Indonesia, Philippines, Hong Kong, Macau and Cambodia), 57, and Sabu (China), 12.